“What? You’re not making any fucking sense.”
He regretted snapping as soon as the words left his mouth, but Rosetta didn’t flinch. She pulled out a chair, sat beside Benito, and folded her hands on the table. “It’s easier for me if I don’t know you’re coming. Like today. I didn’t have time to be afraid. It’s the waiting, you see, that makes me that way.”
Benito processed, turning the explanation over in his mind until it made some kind of sense. He thought of the big raid his contact in Asa’s crew had turned him onto just a few hours ago. How the anticipation was killing him and he’d hit it right now if he could.
He thought of Mickey too, and the wild butterflies in his belly each time he drove to meet him. Sometimes he thought that might kill him, but it was the sweetest pain.
Focus. He looked at Rosetta again. “Thank you for telling me,” he said slowly. “I’ve never thought about it like that. I can try and come by at less obvious times, if that helps.”
Rosetta’s hesitant smile turned wry. “My boy, you never do anything obvious. It’s what makes you so formidable.”
A bitter laugh escaped Benito before he could catch it. “That’s a big word I don’t deserve, but thanks.”
He drained his coffee and stood, taking his plate to the sink and washing it on autopilot. Roberto had been the scuzziest human to live with, but he’d always been quick to punish Benito for not completing his chores fast enough. If Benito thought too hard, he could still feel the heel of Roberto’s hand hitting his temple.
So don’t think about it.
Mickey was the quickest remedy. Benito thought of the last time they’d been together, leaning against his car as Benito had walked to his own. It had been raining and windy, but Mickey didn’t seem to feel the cold. He was solid warmth, in every fucking sense, and with damp hair? Man. Benito couldn’t cope.
He turned from the sink to find Rosetta watching him. “What?”
“I was speaking,” she said. “You didn’t hear me. Is something on your mind?”
“What were you saying?”
“I was saying that I told the housing officer what I told you. He said he’ll surprise me next time he comes. I like him, Beni. He’s a nice boy.
“He’s a grown man, Mum.”
“Is he? I thought he was younger than you.”
“He could be eight years younger than me and still be a man.”
“Oh. Yes. I suppose he could be.” Rosetta reached around Benito and took his plate from the rack.
She dried it and put it away.
Benito took it as his cue to leave. He snagged his keys from the table and drifted to the door, but his feet seemed to drag with every step.
Rosetta followed him into the hallway. For a moment, Benito thought—perhaps even feared—she might hug him.
She didn’t.
15
“Why are you answering your mum’s phone? Is everything okay?” Mickey swung his car into a space on an estate on the other side of Bletchley and checked he’d called the right number. He was used to Rosetta De Luca’s phone ringing out or going straight to voicemail. It had been . . . fuck, he didn’t even know how long it had been since an actual human had answered.
Gianna De Luca giggled. “You sound really freaked out.”
“I’m just surprised. I was going to leave a message. Now, answer my question. Everything okay?”
“Yeah. Mum’s in the bath. I think she would’ve answered if she’d heard the phone. She’s doing much better at that.”
“It went well with the counsellor then?”
“Uh-huh. She’s trying really hard. She made my brother breakfast the other day.”
Mickey searched his car for cigarettes. Over the past few weeks, the time he’d spent with Benito had been so healthy and wholesome his consumption had gone down, but in the middle of the longest Wednesday in the history of Wednesdays, he needed a fucking smoke.
The glovebox was empty, though, and a scrambled hand under the seats turned up nothing either.
Sighing, he focused on Gianna. On Benito’s sister. Because wasn’t that a lovely conflict of interest? “Breakfast? That’s nice.” I know he likes breakfast. “For you too, I guess?”
“I wasn’t here. I was at school. But Beni said he’s going to come and see Mum more when I’m not around. Surprise her so she doesn’t get scared and lock him out.”
“She asked me to do that too. No breakfast offer, though. Maybe I’m in the wrong job.”
Gianna laughed like a tinkling bell. Mickey smiled too. Benito’s little sister was wise beyond her years, and it felt good to hear her sound her age. “She has lemon cake in the fridge if you wanted to drop by today. I won’t tell her you might come.”
Mickey eyed the clock. Convincing an elderly tenant she didn’t need to keep every newspaper she’d ever bought had already taken an hour longer than he had time for, and he had no real reason to visit Rosetta De Luca beyond a welfare check that wasn’t strictly necessary now he’d spoken to Gianna, but . . .
She was Benito’s mother. His family. Whatever he and Mickey were to each other, he wasn’t going to miss an opportunity to make sure her and Gianna were safe and well.
“Okay,” he said. “Don’t tell her I’m coming because I might not make it, but if I get time, I’ll swing by before I head home.”
Gianna agreed and ended the call, leaving Mickey to stare at his phone and wonder if Wednesday was trying to turn his entire world upside down.
He spent the rest of the day on the Netherfield estate, driving from house to house and dealing with everything from unpaid rent to fixing doors that had been kicked in by the police. Sometimes he screwed the doors back in himself and “forgot” to write a report. Not because he gave a shit about whoever was stashing coke and weed in their nan’s loft, but because he wasn’t about to evict a ninety-year-old from her home because her grandson was a scrote.
Is he a scrote, though? Or is he just a kid with no options?
Mickey drowned out whatever answer his brain conjured up with his drill. The crunching sound suited his mood, and the vibration of the drill masked any jitters in his hands, but it wasn’t all bad. He’d be lying if he didn’t admit the last few weeks had been easier with Benito around. They didn’t do much, just walked around, shared cheap meals, and worked out at Mickey’s gym. They hadn’t fucked. Or even kissed. And despite a raging inferno in his bones every time Benito was close, Mickey was okay with that.
He wanted Benito more than ever, but somehow, the simple things had begun to matter more.
It was five o’clock when he left Netherfield. Traffic was murder. By the time Isha called, Mickey hadn’t moved for twenty minutes.
Isha chuckled. “Sorry about that, but it’s probably just as well. I just got out of a meeting with the council and the cladding firm that did Barnfield. They’re coming in two weeks to install the fire breaks.”
“The fire breaks they said we didn’t need because there’s nothing unsafe about that fucking cladding?”
“Yes, those ones,” Isha said dryly. “Turns out they were full of shit, but that’s no surprise. They wanted to wait until the summer to install the breaks, but Dom went postal on them and they, er, changed their minds.”